Algerian Troll Army Launches Digital Assault on France Amid Diplomatic Crisis

The tensions between Paris and Algiers are far from subsiding. According to a confidential note from Viginum, revealed by Le Canard enchaîné, pro-Algeria trolls would publish "exactly the same content at the same time or a few minutes apart" in order to manipulate public opinion and harm the French government.

According to this document, 4,652 online publications and 55 YouTube videos reporting on an alleged DGSE conspiracy against Algeria were recorded in just twenty days in December 2024. Similarly, a boycott campaign targeting around fifty French brands such as Tefal, La Vache qui rit, Peugeot or Lacoste, would have been carried out between January 17 and 20, 2025.

Also, photomontages showing Emmanuel Macron with the mark of a red hand on his face facing Abdelmadjid Tebboune, suggesting that the French president would have been slapped by his Algerian counterpart, have been circulating on social networks in recent February. Pro-Algeria fake accounts had also attacked Bruno Retailleau and the former Prime Minister, Édouard Philippe, we learn.

According to the note, these trolls would have been created in 2014 with the aim of damaging the image of King Mohammed VI of Morocco, and then of breaking in 2019 the Hirak protest movement. According to Le Canard enchaîné, the National Body for the Prevention and Fight against Offenses related to Information and Communication Technologies (ONPLITIC), under the Algerian Ministry of Defense, could be behind these trolls.